From leading students to leading teachers: Group works to make schools better

Sitting in the school library at Success College Prep in Treme, kindergarten teacher Erin Oliver had trouble putting into words what worries her about getting a promotion next year. She sat across from Elizabeth Elizardi, from a group called Leading Educators, who prodded her along. "I hear a little critic coming into the conversation," Elizardi said. "What is that little critic telling you about your job next year? What are you hearing?"

A long pause followed while Oliver searched the ceiling tiles for an answer. Finally, she admitted that moving up the ladder has her nervous about how colleagues will react, that they'll see her as "taking the easier road by not working full-time in the classroom next year."

This is the leap that Elizardi and the rest of the staff at Leading Educators, a New Orleans-based nonprofit group, are trying to help teachers make: to go from leading students to leading teachers.

With the help of coaching sessions like this during a two-year fellowship, Oliver is now slated to head Success Prep's Response to Intervention program, which targets students who are falling behind with more intensive academic coaching. Other Leading Educators fellows at schools across the region will become department heads or mentors or assistant principals.

This may not seem like the sexiest work -- essentially preparing a school's middle management -- but proponents see it as critical, and until now a missing link in how the United States trains its teachers. They view it as a way for the teaching profession to hold on to people like Oliver, who have ambitions outside the classroom, but no clear path to a greater leadership role inside the world of education.

"The problem we're trying to address is that fact that half of new teachers leave within their first five years," said Jonas Chartock, Leading Educators' chief executive. "What we know is the most effective teachers are actually the most likely to move from high-needs schools or leave the profession entirely, so we're focused on the skills it takes to feel successful within a challenging school. The No. 1 reason people stay in any job is because they feel their careers are moving forward."

Chartock has been in charge of Leading Educators since last year. He was hired to take the group fully independent. It began in 2008 with financial ties to New Leaders for New Schools, a group that trains principals. Now, Chartock's goal is to move into two new regions of the country every year for the next five years, an expansion that began last September in Kansas City.

As with any nonprofit group, finding the cash to do it poses a challenge. The national push has the backing of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, one of the biggest providers of philanthropic dollars to education initiatives in the United States. Other foundation supporters have stepped in as well, but Chartock said that long-term, the training his group provides will be paid for through a more balanced mix of public and private money.

Aside from fellowships, the group is planning to offer training programs to public school districts and charter school networks, acting essentially as a consulting group supported by fees.

The fellowship program, which costs the group about $9,500 per fellow, will continue to rely on a combination of revenue sources, Chartock said, adding that he expects that cost to shrink somewhat. The schools where fellows work pick up about a third of the expense.

At the moment, Leading Educators is training 67 teachers. They begin with training sessions during the summer, continue with monthly workshops, discussion groups and coaching sessions during the school year, and finish the two-year fellowship by completing a capstone project within their school.

Oliver's project is Success Prep's Response to Intervention program, commonly referred to in education circles as RTI. For the past two years, she has been focused on how to organize a group of teachers to quickly spot students who are falling behind on diagnostic tests and either get them up to speed or identify those who have unmet special needs. Before Oliver's project, the school had no systematic approach for doing this.

Her principal, Niloy Gangopadhyay, said it is already having tangible results, even with Oliver organizing the effort in addition to full-time teaching duties. Gangopadhyay said almost a dozen students who might have simply been classified as having a special need got caught up in the small pull-out groups Oliver has put together. This year, he said, three students who had been left back in the first grade are now up to speed and doing third-grade work before the semester is even out.

Gangopadhyay noted that as a "mom-and-pop" charter school, Success Prep doesn't have the capacity to put any kind of comprehensive training program in place that will give teachers the skills to be leaders. Many charter schools in New Orleans are part of larger charter networks that can share staff, so Leading Educators has stepped in to play the network's role.

"In two years," Gangopadhyay said of Oliver, "she's grown tremendously."